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A comparison of aggressive-rejected and nonaggressive-rejected children's interpretations of self-directed and other-directed rejection.

Publication ,  Journal Article
Zakriski, AL; Coie, JD
Published in: Child development
June 1996

The hypothesis that aggressive-rejected children are unaware of their social status because they are self-protective when processing negative peer feedback was tested in 3 studies. In Study 1, fourth-grade girls and boys were asked to name peers they liked or disliked, as well as peers they thought liked or disliked them. Comparisons of aggressive-rejected, nonaggressive-rejected, and average status groups revealed that aggressive-rejected children were more unrealistic in their assessments of their social status than were nonaggressive-rejected children. In Study 2, rejected and average boys identified in Study 1 were asked to name who they thought liked or disliked other children from their classroom. Comparisons of perceived and actual nominations for peers revealed that aggressive-rejected children were able to assess the social status of others as well as did nonaggressive-rejected and average status children. Because the difficulties aggressive-rejected children demonstrated in Study 1 did not generalize to judging the status of others in Study 2, the self-protective hypothesis was supported. Study 3 provided a parallel test of this hypothesis under more controlled conditions. Subjects from Study 2 viewed other children receiving rejection feedback from peers in videotaped interactions and received similar feedback themselves from experimental confederates. While all subjects rated self-directed feedback somewhat more positively than other-directed feedback, aggressive-rejected subjects had the largest self-favoring discrepancy between their judgments of self- and other-directed feedback. These findings also suggest that aggressive-rejected children may make self-protective "errors" when judging other children's negative feelings about them. Ethnicity differences in evaluating peer feedback emerged in Studies 1 and 3, raising questions about the impact of minority status on children's evaluations of rejection feedback.

Duke Scholars

Published In

Child development

DOI

EISSN

1467-8624

ISSN

0009-3920

Publication Date

June 1996

Volume

67

Issue

3

Start / End Page

1048 / 1070

Related Subject Headings

  • Sociometric Techniques
  • Social Perception
  • Self Concept
  • Rejection, Psychology
  • Peer Group
  • Male
  • Internal-External Control
  • Individuality
  • Humans
  • Female
 

Citation

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Zakriski, A. L., & Coie, J. D. (1996). A comparison of aggressive-rejected and nonaggressive-rejected children's interpretations of self-directed and other-directed rejection. Child Development, 67(3), 1048–1070. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.1996.tb01782.x
Zakriski, A. L., and J. D. Coie. “A comparison of aggressive-rejected and nonaggressive-rejected children's interpretations of self-directed and other-directed rejection.Child Development 67, no. 3 (June 1996): 1048–70. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.1996.tb01782.x.
Zakriski, A. L., and J. D. Coie. “A comparison of aggressive-rejected and nonaggressive-rejected children's interpretations of self-directed and other-directed rejection.Child Development, vol. 67, no. 3, June 1996, pp. 1048–70. Epmc, doi:10.1111/j.1467-8624.1996.tb01782.x.
Journal cover image

Published In

Child development

DOI

EISSN

1467-8624

ISSN

0009-3920

Publication Date

June 1996

Volume

67

Issue

3

Start / End Page

1048 / 1070

Related Subject Headings

  • Sociometric Techniques
  • Social Perception
  • Self Concept
  • Rejection, Psychology
  • Peer Group
  • Male
  • Internal-External Control
  • Individuality
  • Humans
  • Female